Image by Intothelight Photography at Shuttlestock
Metlen’s investment will bring commercial-scale gallium production back to Europe for the first time since 2016. It is the first in what many will hope will be a flurry of new investments in heavily concentrated critical mineral
supply chains , Fastmarkets’ Solomon Cefai reports
In January, Greek energy and metal conglomerate Metlen said it was ready to invest €295 million ($320 mn) in a project that will see it become Europe’s first commercial-scale gallium producer since 2016. Initial production should begin gradually in 2027, before ramping up to its full capacity of 50 tonnes per year in 2028.
That is good news for Europe’s gallium consumers (and for critical mineral lobbyists and consultants everywhere in the Western world).
Fully a year and a half after the alarm bells began ringing for Western governments, when China put gallium supply fully under the spotlight by announcing export controls on the metal, along with another ‘g’ minor metal – germanium – Metlen gallium project is, by some margin, the most significant announced investment in the metal outside China.
The overwhelming majority of gallium production is concentrated in China, and the metal’s critical role in a number of technology sectors ̶ not least semiconductors ̶ have made gallium’s supply a battleground in the US-China chip and technology war.
Since China’s export controls were first announced, there has been a flurry of suggestions – realistic and not so realistic – about restarting gallium production outside of China.
Several junior miners have proudly revealed gallium contents in their mineral resources. And there was even speculation about restarting production at the Pinjarra gallium smelter in Australia, which is not thought to have been operational since around the turn of the century.
An early company to announce it was pondering investing in new gallium production was Trafigura-owned Nyrstar, whose proposal to produce gallium and germanium at its Clarksville, Tennessee zinc smelter in the US came in 2022 – predating China’s export controls.
The company put a price tag of $150 million on upgrading its plant to extract gallium and germanium by-products to supply the US market, but at of the time of writing there have been no further updates on the project.
Then in 2023, Metlen (then known as Mytilineos) said it was considering upgrading its pilot gallium production process to commercial-scale production. At the time, in comments to Fastmarkets, it flagged gallium’s price volatility and technological hurdles, as the main challenges with production.
Mining giant Rio Tinto also jumped into the fray late last year, announcing plans for a gallium demonstration plant in Quebec, Canada, which could lead to an eventual production target of 40 tonnes per year, after the completion of a pilot process.
Why now?
A Metlen spokesperson told Fastmarkets that its investment in the project, which will also increase bauxite and alumina capacity, meets the criteria for the European Union’s Temporary Crisis & Transition Framework, which loosens its state funding rules for specific projects. It has also been certified as making a significant contribution to EU critical raw material self-sufficiency, meaning it could be prioritized for other funding via a number of other European programmes.
© Fastmarkets, 2025
Gallium prices have also soared. Prices in the European spot market, as Fastmarkets’ assesses them, are at highs not seen since 2011.
And concerns about a potential escalation in the implementation of the export controls has also compounded bullish price sentiment.
China announced in December last year that it was banning exports of gallium, germanium, and antimony to the US. And although an implicit ban was already in place and had been since the export controls were first announced, gallium prices jolted upwards after the pronouncement.
Market participants were concerned that the country would clamp down on Chinese gallium re-exported from Europe and elsewhere into the US, potentially making it even harder for traders to source material from China.
There are major ex-China gallium producers in Russia, Japan, Slovakia and Canada, but they have been unable to completely neutralise the impact of China’s lost exports. China exported 47 tonnes of what its customs department calls ‘wrought gallium’ in 2024, 21 tonnes less than the 68 tonnes it had exported in 2022.
This has had ramifications for Chinese producers that had been expected to substantially expand production in 2024. They have been hit by constrained selling opportunities on the international market, but also a reduced domestic market owing to underwhelming demand for rare earth magnets and, as Fastmarkets reported in January 2025, from the huge solar sector.
Over the first six months of export controls being in place, gallium market prices have adjusted to the new regime. Fastmarkets price assessment for gallium 99.99% Ga min, in-warehouse China, was 1,780-1,820 yuan ($244-250) per kg on January 17, 2025, slightly down from 1,850-1,950 yuan per kg in the last session before the export controls came into effect on July 28, 2024.
Secondary refiners have picked up some of the slack from left by the lack of Chinese exports. US gallium imports from Canada, for example, soared to 5.7 tonnes between January and November 2024 (data for December is not yet available), up from 2.8 tonnes in the same period in 2023, and 1.5 tonnes in the same period of 2022.
And indeed, as Fastmarkets reported in December, the US is still indirectly importing germanium and gallium from China.
In Europe, Fastmarkets’ price assessment for gallium 99.99% Ga min, in-warehouse Rotterdam averaged $598.33 per kg in January 2025, more than twice the price in China, which suggested a premium market for gallium has not only taken hold, but it has stuck.
After initial price increases in March 2024, immediately after the initial notification of the Chinese export controls, prices then stagnated and appeared to be following a general downward trend, until China’s implementation of the export controls injected some excitement back into the market. And the drive to reintroduce rare earth magnet production in Europe and North America could, if successful, support the consumption of gallium. High-performance neodymium iron boron rare earth permanent magnets are now the largest single application for gallium metal – although they still consume far less than all electronics applications combined.
In the germanium market, which is distinctive because of its higher prices and existing Western production capability, Umicore signed an agreement in May 2024 to source germanium concentrates from the Democratic Republic of Congo.
And in the antimony market, there has also been progress, with Wogen and Larvotto signing an offtake agreement for the Hillgrove antimony project in Australia.
The market for the fourth of China’s export-controlled critical materials, graphite, is already in a significant oversupply situation globally, and much more geographically dispersed, with several projects in southeast Africa. Support for ex-China production has mostly been mobilised by US financial and tax incentives. China’s producers of spherical graphite, the natural graphite anode feedstock, meanwhile, have been locked in a race to the bottom.
But in the case of gallium, there are signs that aspiring ex-China producers could face additional problems. Early in January, China’s Ministry of Finance and Commerce announced it was considering introducing controls on exports of the technology required to produce gallium.
Metlen, at least, has already been testing gallium extraction for the past three years, and is currently optimising the hydrometallurgical and electrowinning process, while building its commercial ecosystem, the company spokesperson said.
By Solomon Cefai
Price reporter, Fastmarkets
